North Dakota has a different kind of banking sector than the rest of the country does, with six times as many locally owned financial institutions per person as the rest of the U.S., and local institutions controlling 83 percent of the market. What is North Dakota doing differently? A lot of the answer is the Bank of North Dakota.… Read More
Amazon’s predatory monopoly is still unchecked, but a coalition of authors is calling on the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate it. In a 24-page letter, the coalition contends that Amazon is abusing its market power in ways that undermine competition and compromise liberty, free speech, and democracy.
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Thanks in large part to the Bank of North Dakota, community banks and credit unions are much more robust in North Dakota than in other states.… Read More
No company moves as much stuff across the world’s oceans as Walmart does, and the climate consequences are immense. Ferrying all those cheap TVs, T-shirts, toasters, and toys from Asian factories to ports in the U.S. and elsewhere releases huge amounts of greenhouse pollutants into the atmosphere, including both carbon dioxide (CO2) and black carbon. We’ve compiled a few key data points on shipping’s climate impact and Walmart’s dominance in the movement of goods across the world’s oceans.… Read More
In our op-ed for the Wall Street Journal, we look at how much of our public policy seems to designed to bend the market in the favor of big corporations, and put small, independent businesses at a competitive disadvantage.… Read More
The precipitous decline in the number of community banks in recent years is a national crisis, and there’s a fierce debate underway right now about what’s to blame.… Read More
This week, ILSR’s Stacy Mitchell shared her research and perspective with members of Congress at a hearing organized by the Congressional Progressive Caucus. The forum focused on how federal contracting and other forms of financial support for business should be overhauled to reflect American values of fairness, opportunity, and broad prosperity. … Read More
Walmart continues to expand, and rapidly. The company is now embarking on its third historic wave of store construction, with plans to build 440 to 460 “Neighborhood Market” stores over a two year period, presumably with many hundreds more to follow. There is a critical debate to be had right now about whether a company that already captures one-quarter of U.S. grocery sales should be allowed to grow to control one-third, or even half, of our food supply. … Read More
The Sustainability Leaders badge is straight out of Walmart’s 10-year-old greenwashing playbook. Once again, Walmart has engineered an appealing media story about itself as a green innovator that has little to do with reality. … Read More
